


reflections of a different kind

by purplebookends



Series: you're one of the few things that i'm sure of [1]
Category: SKAM (Norway)
Genre: F/F, compulsory heterosexuality, probably unrealistic but im in my feelings so s c r e w it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-03
Updated: 2018-11-03
Packaged: 2019-08-17 05:43:36
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,289
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16510439
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/purplebookends/pseuds/purplebookends
Summary: After Sana’s Eid party, Vilde sticks around to watch the sun go down. Magnus joins her. She has something important to tell him; he knows it’s coming.





	reflections of a different kind

It’s dark, and behind her the party falters in blinking fairy lights. In the dark, she doesn’t feel so...visible. She goes with the air like she’s one with the earth, and people don’t stare. She used to like being seen; now she’d want to do just about anything else. The dark night hugs her warm; wraps around her like a comforting blanket, leaving her feeling somewhat at peace.

In front of her, the sun fades slowly from its place in the sky, bringing the day to a close. Technically, it ended hours ago: when the clock ticked twelve and the church bells around the city rang the night in, but it’s still been light out. Till now, of course. Everything has been light, until now.

Vilde isn’t entirely sure how it started: maybe it was the image of the decorated backyard, with fairy lights and tables with food scattered all across; the image of something so happy, that gets to just...exist. Or maybe it was feeling completely content standing quietly next to Eva, hands brushing lightly together on happy accidents; only to have it completely disappear when Magnus wrapped his arms around her upper body.

Or maybe it’s both.

Vilde doesn’t think it matters.

She can’t look at Magnus the same anymore. She can’t get herself to look him in the eyes, or smile at him, or touch him, or even let him touch her. Vilde feels broken: like something is wrong with her, and she can’t figure out what.

Except...she knows what it is. She’s always known; but the pure simplicity of pushing the thought away has always been more appealing than dealing with it.

(Vilde regrets that now).

Boys are...cute. Magnus is cute. But they don’t have the softness of Eva’s fingertips touching her arm, or the power to give her chills when they whisper drunken words in her ear like Eva does. Or the tenderness of Eva’s lips, or the depth of her laugh. Magnus isn’t Eva.

In the reflection of the sundown, she can see herself; years ahead, smiling over a cafe table, one hand draped across the table, cupping Eva’s, the other resting in her lap. Conversations on dinner plans for the evening and jokes about babies linger on their tongues, and Vilde watches fondly as Eva laughs at the thought of naming their first born Christopher.

Vilde almost cracks a smile, until she glances back at the crowd and sees her laughing and grinning: bopping Jonas’ chest all the while. A sinking feeling reaches the surface of Vilde’s chest, and she swallows the bubble of jealousy that’s made its way to her throat.

Her eyes fall back on the sundown; it’s staring back at her in colors of purple and blue and pink and yellow now, and Vilde has to suppress the immense need to pick up her phone and take a picture of it. She would rather just sit here, alone, with the low hum of Ed Sheeran playing in the background, and watch the sun go down instead of looking at it through the screen of her phone; but a part of her still wishes her eyes could take photos for her and upload them to iCloud.

The colors remind her of Eva; pink, because it’s the color she thinks about when Eva laughs. Purple, because it represents the healing feeling that takes over Vilde when Eva hugs her; blue, because of the blue sweater she wore at their first sleepover that Vilde adores so much. And yellow, because to Vilde, Eva shines as bright as the stars in the sky, and wears smiles as bright as the sun.

She thinks about what Chris told her earlier: how she always had a friend in her, how she could always, always come to her with anything: whatever it may be. And then Vilde had been so stupid to look at Magnus - Magnus! - instead of thanking Chris for offering her shoulder.

She can’t talk to Magnus about this - she can barely look at him! How is she supposed to tell him how she feels for her best friend, if she can’t even look at his shoes? If Vilde could, she would run home right now and bury herself in the comfort of her own bed.

‘’So,’’ she hears from behind her. Vilde holds her breath. The familiar footsteps round the bench, and a second later, he sits down. ‘’You’ve been ignoring me.’’

After moments of silence, Vilde wills herself to look up at him; to meet those grey eyes she knows so well; to stare right into the eyes of the heart she’s about to break. She expects him to be mad, upset that she hasn’t spoken to him since Jonas read his speech, but instead she finds him smiling at her.

‘’Are you okay? You’ve been so quiet all night. I thought you’d left - you’re usually never this quiet.’’ His voice is soft when he speaks, and for a mere second, Vilde can see why she ‘’fell’’ in love with him. He’s understanding, and funny, and sweet. But he’s a boy, a voice in the back of Vilde’s mind coos, you don’t want a boy.

Vilde nods. Just barely; but she knows Magnus sees it. He has a good attention to detail, she’s always liked that about him.

‘’I don’t buy it,’’ he tells her, not inching closer, just adjusting his leg where he sits. ‘’You don’t sit by yourself when you’re okay, especially not when your best friends are here. What’s going on Vilde?’’

He doesn’t call her babe. He sometimes does that. If this were yesterday, he would have. Vilde pushes down the slight panic that arises.

Her fingers grip the fabric of her dress, and she twirls it around between the tips of her fingers, biting down at her bottom lip. Wishing: hoping: praying, that this situation will end. She closes her eyes for two mere seconds. It doesn’t work - when she opens them up again, Magnus is still sitting beside her, and it sinks into her that she still has yet to answer his question.

‘’It’s nothing,’’ Vilde says, tasting the way the lie feels on her tongue. ‘’And it’s, uh - everything,’’ she looks up, meeting his blue eyes, staring back at her. ‘’It’s everything,’’ she says again, quieter this time, as if the word would provoke some kind of dangerous legend, if spoken loudly enough.

Maybe it would, Vilde thinks, maybe it would be for the best if a demon came and spilled all her secrets. She wouldn’t have to pretend anymore. She wishes she wouldn’t have to pretend anymore. Why is this so hard for her? They’re just words. Words she could say, and this would all be over. Except she feels like, if she does, it might just be the beginning. That if she says it - those four words - the world might stop spinning.

‘’Everything?’’ Magnus says, ‘’could you expand on that? Everything is kind of vast,’’ he chuckles, biting his bottom lip.

Vilde doesn’t laugh. Instead, she shrugs.

‘’I, uh,’’ Come on, Vilde, just say it. She presses her lips together. They make a thin line.

But she can’t. Her words stop there, resting in her mouth, cutting the conversation short. Vilde looks away, back at the sky. The sky, she thinks, in all its colorful glory, isn’t ashamed. The sky just is. It exists in every color the human eye can comprehend, and contently so. It doesn’t care what everyone thinks of it. It doesn’t worry about being judged for who it loves. It doesn’t worry about the pending heartbreak that’s awaiting it.

It’s not just the big part of it - saying the words, admitting it to herself. It’s the tiny everythings that come after. Telling her mom, her grandma, her friends. Every future person in her life. Telling Eva, confessing to Eva. The possibility of heartbreak when she tells Eva.

Suddenly, Vilde is crying. Tears of exhaustion and hope and devastation. It’s clear the outpour of emotions was expected on Magnus’ part, because he just wraps his arms around her, pulling her closer, but not too close. Because he knows, Vilde thinks. He knows.

She’s so tired - tired of fighting a battle with herself she’s never going to win. She just wants to curl up in Eva’s arms - like she could last year - and cry and laugh until it all goes away. She wants everything to go back to the way it was.

Eva’s been distant. And maybe that’s because Vilde has been distant, and maybe she deserves it, but she still feels it like a child would a bike-wound. Vilde doesn’t want distant-Chris-dating-Eva. She wants always-happy-to-hang-out-with-her-and-watch-movies-and-braid-her-hair-Eva. And right now, she’s crying about it in Magnus’ arms. Vilde tenses up.

‘’Hey, hey, hey,’’ Magnus says, ‘’it’s okay. Just let it out, okay? You’re okay.’’

He doesn’t run his arms up hers, he just holds her. If Vilde liked boys, she decides, she would like Magnus very much.

‘’You don’t, though,’’ Magnus says.

Vilde stops crying. Just like that, her tear ducts dry up. Her eyes widen, and her mouth opens, then closes again. She keeps her eyes on the city before her, firmly positioned on the nearest church. Holy granola bars, did she say that aloud?

She must have. Magnus is not a mind reader.

In a moment of bravery, Vilde looks up at him, and swallows hard when she meets his eyes because oh my God, she said that aloud. She feels the tears prickle at her eyelids again.

Stupid, stupid, stupid. Stupid, dumb, idiotic idiot. Thoughts of her complete incompetent brain gathers up in her head and circle through the tunnels of her mind. She can feel the panic rise up inside her chest.

She can’t breathe. You can, Vilde tells herself, just do it. In, out, in, out. Deep breaths. In a moment of panic, she thinks of Eva. The soft heaving of her chest as she slept in Vilde’s bed last spring. The one time she had allowed any one of her friends to come to her house. Eva had been so sweet and so un-Eva about her mom, and Vilde had felt almost compelled to ask her to stay over. That was when Vilde knew.

She looks up at Magnus, her breathing steadier now, and surprise washes over her. He’s not mad. Or, at least he doesn’t look mad. A little sad, maybe, but he doesn’t look mad. Actually, Vilde kind of thinks he’s smiling.

Vilde takes a deep, steady breath. ‘’I’malesbian.’’

It comes out in one low, hushed murmur, and Vilde ducks away the second it’s over.

Lesbian. She’s a lesbian. Girls. She likes girls. She loves girls. One girl.

‘’I know,’’ Magnus says.

‘’You know?’’ Vilde asks.

‘’Okay,’’ Magnus says, ‘’maybe not knew-knew. But it had crossed my mind.’’

‘’And you’re not mad?’’

Magnus shakes his head. ‘’You are who you are. Even though I sort of wished you had been at a place where you would feel like you could tell me, and not get into a relationship with me, I’m not mad. In fact, I should probably have figured it out before we started going out.’’

Vilde raises an eyebrow. ‘’What? Why?’’

‘’Oh come on,’’ Magnus says, ‘’anybody who spends a lot of time watching you, knows you’ve got heart eyes for the Bergen girl.’’

She doesn’t freak out, like she expects herself to. She should be denying all this, should be trying to bury it as deep under the soil as humanly possible. Instead, Vilde finds herself smiling.

‘’Which, by the way,’’ Magnus says, ‘’most people don’t spend as much time watching you as I have. I know you’re worried about what people think, and though it doesn’t concern me, I just wanted to tell you that you’re safe. I don’t think anyone else has noticed.’’

Vilde feels like she should be relieved by his words, and a part of her is, but most of that feeling is disappointment. People should know. She needs them to. She doesn’t think freedom will come her way if they don’t.

‘’Do you think she knows?’’ She asks him, reverting her eyes to the dancing shadow of Eva behind them. Jonas stands near her - not close enough to be dancing with her -, swinging his hips and smiling.

Magnus shrugs. ‘’Maybe not entirely consciously. You know her better than I do, but I think somewhere, a little deeper down than the surface, she knows.’’

Vilde turns back to Magnus. ‘’You’re really smart,’’ she says. Magnus laughs. ‘’Yeah,’’ he says, ‘’thanks for noticing.’’

She shakes her head. ‘’No, I don’t- look, I’m sorry. I’m sorry about all of this. Dragging you along. I knew you had feelings for me. And I did too. Have feelings for you, I mean,’’ she bites her bottom lip. ‘’At least I thought I did, back in December. I thought I could like boys when boys were you. But I think I’ve realized that that’s not how it works. I’m sorry though, for ruining this for you.’’

‘’Stop,’’ Magnus says. ‘’You didn’t. At least not entirely.’’ He winks at her. ‘’I’m cool. We’re cool. Isak talked a bit about that - how hiding himself with a girl he thought was nice did more bad than it did good, and how nothing truly felt okay until he was with Even. That might just be an Isak-and-Even thing, because boy those two are mushy-gushy with each other-’’ Vilde laughs, and Magnus smiles. ‘’But, hearing you say that, I think it applies. You’re okay, Vilde. I’m okay.’’

_You’re okay,_ _Vilde._

It hadn’t dawned on her, till now, how much she desperately needed to hear those words.

You’re okay, Vilde. You are perfectly okay.

 

 

  


**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this about a year ago, and it's just been sitting in my google docs ever since, and i've tweaked it and added a bit, but i'm in my skam feelings right now so i'm just going to post it without striving for perfection 
> 
> anyways, vilde should have ended up with eva and gotten her own season exploring her lesbian identity and her struggle with comp het and that's the tea ! 
> 
> p.s: if this is something you guys like, there might be more coming


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